


Orbital Decay

by cac0daemonia



Series: Clone Wars: Reconstruction Corps AU [15]
Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Blood and Injury, Child Neglect, Fix-It, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Injury Recovery, Kaminoans Being Assholes (Star Wars), Lightsaber Battles (Star Wars), Love Confessions, M/M, Making Out, Reconstruction Corps AU, except like Palps Dooku and Krell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 14:26:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29333772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cac0daemonia/pseuds/cac0daemonia
Summary: Cody and Obi-Wan have been drifting toward each other for years, ever since the war started. Now that the war is over, they're busier than ever, but with an unexpected day of down time to spend together, Cody decides he's going to ask Obi-Wan a question he never thought he'd be able to ask.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Series: Clone Wars: Reconstruction Corps AU [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2048891
Comments: 51
Kudos: 293





	Orbital Decay

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the Reconstruction Corps AU, roughly between "[Oil and Water](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29251665)" and "[Modulation](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29097483)", but Cody references the events of "[That's not how it happened. This is how it happened](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29033334)." It's not essential to have read the other fics, but they give some context.
> 
> I don't think anything in here is _too_ terribly graphic or too sexy-times, but I also watched R-rated movies when I was like 5. So I went with the M rating and the violence warning just to be on the safe side! If you want to avoid the two parts with descriptions of injury, skip to the next paragraph after "The cadet had miscalculated his momentum and the droid fell on him." and the rest of the flashback (***) after "...who’s still leaning against the rock, legs stretched out in front of him."
> 
> As always, my infinite gratitude goes to [Crystalshard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crystalshard/pseuds/Crystalshard) and [Tate_The_Great](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tate_The_Great/pseuds/Tate_The_Great) for beta reading!
> 
> Please let me know if I've forgotten any warnings or tags. :)
> 
> [Tumblr](https://cacodaemonia.tumblr.com/)

The only sound is the shuffling of takeout containers in the small room and the quiet thrum of Coruscant traffic outside Obi-Wan’s window. Cody pauses in the middle of pouring carbosyrup onto his Panna cakes—he can’t recall the last time he sat down for a meal.

Ever since Fives uncovered the truth about the control chips, every day has been a mad dash to get as much planning and strategizing and negotiating done as possible before passing out for three or four hours, then doing it all over again. Cody’s had to resort to consuming enough caf and stims to kill an aiwha just to stay on his feet.

But the initial chaos has finally,  _ maybe _ , started to die down, and they’ve been back on Coruscant for about a rotation after tracking Dooku—Tyranus—to Tython. Cody and a small med team had accompanied Obi-Wan, General Yoda, and General Windu to face the Sith. They’d defeated Dooku, but Obi-Wan was under orders from Master Che not to exert himself for the next 36 hours while his lightsaber wounds heal.

The only item on Cody’s agenda for today had been a meeting with Commander Colt, who will be acting as the clones’ representative for the foreseeable future. The plan was to spend most of the day getting him up to speed on the negotiations and peace talks Cody had already participated in as a temporary representative, then hand him off to Fox for a crash course in Coruscant politics.

When Cody checked his comm at 0530, however, he’d seen a message alerting him that the hyperdrive on Colt’s shuttle had malfunctioned when they were about 6 hours from Coruscant, so the meeting would have to be postponed. Colt and his crew had managed to drop out of hyperspace without damaging the ship, and no one had been injured, but the repairs would take at least a rotation.

Cody, finding himself unexpectedly free, hadn’t known what to do with himself for a moment. But, realizing that Obi-Wan would probably interpret ‘don’t exert yourself’ as ‘practice forms in the training rooms all morning,’ he’d decided to distract Obi-Wan and take advantage of them both having a day off. Cody had commed Obi-wan at 0600, knowing he’d already be up, and suggested they have breakfast and go over some reports they’d been putting off.

That was Cody’s official excuse, anyway. Really, he was trying to work up the courage to ask Obi-Wan about… them.

He’d clamped down on his nerves while putting on his seldom-used dress uniform, then checked out a speeder from the 212th barracks and made his way through the light morning traffic to Dex’s Diner for some greasy breakfast food. Knowing the Besalisk would insist that the meal was on the house, Cody had slipped his few scrounged up credits into the tip jar when Dex’s back was turned, then headed to the Temple. It wasn’t far by speeder, and he’d parked outside the Temple before making his way through the sunlit halls.

He’d been to the Temple many times, and it never seemed deserted, no matter the hour. It was pleasantly quiet this morning, though, and Cody had nodded greetings to the few Jedi and younglings he passed. He’d arrived at Obi-Wan’s door at 0653, a full seven minutes early.

Now they’re sitting across from each other at Obi-Wan’s tiny table, dividing up the containers of food and sipping Dex’s extremely strong caf. Cody would have been happy to brew some tea in the little kitchenette once he arrived, but Obi-Wan had confessed a few days ago that he’d run out and hadn’t had a chance to raid the Temple’s refectory for more, so caf it was.

Pale sunlight spills through the blinds, painting stripes on the wall behind Obi-Wan. His small quarters are filled with the smell of cooked onions and buttery Panna cakes. Cody sips his steaming hot caf, watching Obi-Wan as he takes his first bite of that ‘Hash-Something-or-Other’ he always goes on about when they’re on long campaigns and haven’t eaten anything but rations in weeks.

Obi-Wan closes his eyes, obviously savoring the food, and Cody can’t help but smile. He looks… happy. Tired, but without the constant edge of readiness and calculation that Cody’s so used to seeing.

“Mm…” Obi-Wan hums, and Cody drags his gaze down to his plate as the general opens his eyes. “This is delicious,” he says, and Cody can tell he’s smiling without having to look.

Cody stabs a piece of hotcake with purple… things in it. Some kind of fruit?

“Thank you, Cody.”

“It’s no problem, sir,” he shrugs, taking a bite. It’s sweet and buttery, and a little tart like some of the teas Obi-Wan has had him try. Cody doesn’t have a lot of experience with food outside GAR rations, but his general seems to enjoy bringing back little treats for the 212th officers after he’s been away on Jedi business, or taking Cody to eateries on the very rare occasions they both have free time.

There’s a beat of silence, then, pointedly, “Cooody.”

Cody swallows, snorts quietly. “Sorry, Ooobi-Wan.” He still slips sometimes, when it’s just the two of them, saying ‘sir’ or ‘general.’ In his defense, though, it’s pretty infrequent these days. And he’s tired, so he thinks he should get a pass on this one.

Obi-Wan rolls his eyes, smiling. “How’s your food?”

Cody finishes chewing—unlike Rex, he doesn’t behave like a hungry gundark and talk with his mouth full. “It’s good.” He points at a purple spot in the hotcake with his fork. “Are these some kind of fruit?”

“Probably zoochberries,” Obi-Wan says, leaning over the cluttered table. “May I?”

Cody has the ridiculous urge to spear a bite with his own fork and offer it to Obi-Wan, but instead he nudges the plate forward. “Of course.”

Obi-Wan chooses a particularly fruity bit of hotcake. “Here, have some of mine,” he offers, looking thoughtful while he chews. “Mm, yes, zoochberries.”

Cody reaches across and cuts off a piece of the egg thing—he thinks he remembers Dex calling it an omelet—and pops it into his mouth, looking back up.

Obi-Wan is smiling at him.

Which isn’t unusual. But Obi-Wan has a lot of smiles, and it took Cody several months to categorize them all. There was the pleasantly bland smile his general used on haughty diplomats and senators, to convince them that he couldn’t possibly be a threat to their scheming. There was the flirty one he aimed at his enemies, though there was also a subcategory of that smile, the one Cody labeled the ‘feral grin,’ that didn’t come out nearly as often. That was the one Cody had seen Obi-Wan deploy when an enemy was certain they were victorious, only to be spectacularly proven wrong moments later, usually with a lightsaber at their throat. Then there was the one Obi-Wan only seemed to use with Skywalker. It was crooked and generally accompanied by an eye roll and fondly sarcastic jab. One of Cody’s favorites was the one Obi-Wan directed at Tano and the men of the 212th and 501st. It lifted his eyebrows just a little, and made the corners of his eye crinkle. Cody always felt something in his chest clench when he saw it.

But this isn’t any of those smiles.

This one Cody has only ever seen when it’s just the two of them. Exhausted after hours of strategizing over a holomap, tucked into a tiny camp tent and warming their hands on hot mugs, filling out reports in Obi-Wan’s quarters on the  _ Negotiator _ or the  _ Vigilance _ during long hyperspace jumps, in medbay when one of them was injured and the medics would inexplicably allow the other to stay at their bedside for the night cycle.

Cody, like every other clone, was engineered to have a near-photographic memory. About a year into the war, Obi-Wan had turned that smile on Cody as they stood watching the sun rise over a sea of purple grass. And Cody was suddenly reminded of a passage he’d memorized for an astronomy exam in his command class:

_ A binary star refers to a star system consisting of two stars orbiting around their common barycenter. While most binary systems are stable, orbital decay can lead to a stellar collision. Orbital decay is the gradual decrease of the distance between two orbiting bodies over many orbital periods. Orbits do not decay without some friction-like mechanism which transfers energy from the orbital motion. _

For years now, Cody’s felt like he’s a ship being pulled into a star’s gravity well, ever closer to his general. But Cody isn’t an idiot, and despite the fact that he’s just one in a sea of millions of identical faces, he knows that Obi-Wan feels some kind of pull, too.

And lately, everything has been moving so quickly, and it seems there’s hardly any space between them at all, and—a collision seems inevitable.

Cody smiles back. Even with his bucket on, he’s never been able to resist returning that smile.

They talk quietly as they take their time finishing the meal. Cody’s caf is long gone, but Obi-Wan is still sipping his, so Cody gets up and starts clearing away the plates and disposable containers.

“I’ll take care of these,” Obi-Wan protests, standing. “You’re my guest.”

Cody snorts. “And  _ you’re  _ recovering from a couple lightsaber wounds, if I remember correctly.” Setting the plates back down on the table for the moment, Cody gets a hand on Obi-Wan’s elbow and guides him to the tiny sofa.

Obi-Wan rolls his eyes. “Cody, really…” He doesn’t resist, though, when Cody turns him and gently pushes him back until his legs touch the sofa and he’s forced to sit.

Feeling a little smug, Cody turns back to the table. “Drink your caf,” he says, carrying the dishes to the sink and turning the water on. “How  _ are  _ you feeling?”

He hears Obi-Wan sigh. “I’m really fine…”

Cody turns just enough to give Obi-Wan an unimpressed look before starting to wash the few dishes they’d used.

Obi-Wan scoffs quietly, but they’ve had variations on this discussion so many times, they both know the trajectory. “You  _ know _ I’ve had much worse, but… the one on my shoulder is limiting my range of motion—more an annoyance than anything else, really. The one on my side is a bit more bothersome.”

“Mm,” Cody hums, stacking the clean plates and utensils next to the sink. “Are you still on pain meds?”

“You know, I’m starting to think Hazard conned you into bringing me breakfast just so you could mother-nuna me.”

Cody steps back over to the table, glancing at Obi-Wan, whose attempt at looking harassed is failing spectacularly. It makes Cody feel strangely bold. “If that were the case, my pockets would be full of hypos,” he says, raising his arms slightly and turning in a circle, ostensibly to show that he’s not concealing anything.

When he completes the rotation, Obi-Wan’s gaze slides back up to Cody’s face. He doesn’t offer a witty retort, and has seemingly forgotten the cup of caf still in his hand.

Cody raises his eyebrows “The meds?” he asks again, pleased with himself.

“Hmm?” Obi-Wan asks, possibly playing innocent, but he doesn’t have that slight tilt to his eyebrows that gives him away when he’s playing games.

“The pain meds,” Cody repeats softly, though he’s unable to completely contain his smirk. “When did you last take some?”

“Oh,” Obi-Wan starts as Cody turns to gather up the bags and disposable food containers. “Last night, I suppose.” Cody thinks his ability to sound like a sulky cadet is rivaled only by Tano and Skywalker, even if it’s mostly a show.

Cody tosses the trash down a chute near the sink, fills a glass with water, and crosses the main room to the tiny attached ‘fresher. Rummaging one-handed in the single drawer, Cody finds the appropriate bottle, and brings both bottle and glass to where Obi-Wan is still sitting, watching him.

He sets them on the low table in front of the sofa with a click, then sits down next to Obi-Wan, careful to leave a little space between them.

They have a short staring contest, then Obi-Wan puts his coffee down and uncaps the bottle, tipping two pills into his palm. “If I fall asleep while we’re going over reports, it’s your fault,” he mutters, then swallows the pills with some water.

“Noted,” Cody huffs quietly, smiling. He leans over to rifle through the pack he’d brought along, buying some time and wanting to offer up the datapads that were his official excuse for coming over in the first place. They may not get a stretch of quiet time like this again for weeks, maybe months. And if he can just work up the nerve to ask...

Cody had tried  _ so  _ hard not to fall in love with Obi-Wan. He could respect and admire the man, and want to protect him because he’s a Jedi and crucial to the war effort. He could even care for him on a personal level, because that’s not unprofessional. But he could  _ not  _ fall in love with his Jedi general.

And it wasn’t just because they were at war and Obi-Wan was his commanding officer. That was bad enough, but the real reason was one Cody tried very hard not to think about.

Every clone had been conditioned to conform and obey. And if they didn’t—if their behavior or performance were deemed unacceptable, or their appearance too aberrant—there were consequences. Cody will never forget the morning the Kaminoans took CC-1010 away for being disobedient and questioning orders on too many times. When he was brought back to their section of sleeping pods that evening, he didn’t remember his batchmates. And he didn't question orders after that.

That was just before their third year assessment.

When Cody and his batchmates were five—developmentally ten—they’d been running through a battle simulation with two other squads in a training room. None of them had live weapons yet, and neither did their droid adversaries. But one cadet in Shen Squad had slid across the floor to knock the legs out from under a B1 battle droid. The cadet had miscalculated his momentum and the droid fell  _ on  _ him. He had howled and thrashed in pain, and despite their training, the other cadets had all frozen in shock. The droid’s blaster had jammed deep into the cadet’s eye socket, and Cody can still see the blood smears left on the floor after a medical droid had been called in to carry the cadet away.

They all had to repeat the exercise the next day, but Shen Squad was down to four members.

That was just the way life was for Cody and every other clone. It was normal. But then the war had begun, and Cody had met his general.

His general, who asked for Cody’s  _ name _ , and his opinions, and put himself in harm’s way to save the lives of clones who were created to be replaceable gears in the machine of war. He remembered the names of the men in the 212th, and held their hands when they lay dying in the dirt, and pretended he wasn’t hungry when they were short on rations so he could give his portion to a shiny who was only nine and hadn’t even grown into his armor yet. He talked with Cody about things that had nothing to do with the war, and he was a knot of anger and tension for days after Umbara, and when he smiled at Cody it felt like warm sunlight on Cody’s face and fresh air in his lungs after being stuck in his bucket for too long.

His general, who also knew about what happened on Kamino.

If Cody let himself think about it, the dissonance between what he  _ felt  _ and what he  _ knew  _ made his chest squeeze like he was being crushed by an AT-RT.

A few months after Umbara, he and Rex had been holed up in Rex’s tiny quarters on the  _ Challenger _ , sharing a bottle of hideously strong alcohol that one of the 501st boys was experimenting with. Somehow or other, they’d gotten onto the topic of Kenobi—because the fact that he called his general ‘Obi-Wan’ in private was something he kept tucked away and protected like a delicate flower—and Rex had teased him about how Kenobi looked at Cody the way Bly looked at General Secura.

Cody, apparently a lot more affected by the alcohol than he realized, had put his head in his hands and babbled about his general until Rex had abruptly stopped joking and pulled Cody against his chest. He’s pretty sure he remembers uttering the words, “I love him, but I  _ can’t  _ love him.  _ How  _ can I love him?”

Then Fives had changed everything. Even amidst the gutting horror of finding out about the chips and Palpatine’s plan, something inside of Cody had finally shaken loose when Obi-Wan admitted that he didn’t know about the reconditioning and decommissioning practices on Kamino. Cody knew all of Obi-Wan’s tells when he was obfuscating the truth or outright lying, so there wasn’t a doubt in his mind that his general was telling the truth.

And now… With the war over, Cody finds he has no arguments left, no reasons why he  _ can’t _ love Obi-Wan.

There are Obi-Wan’s vows as a Jedi, of course, but even before Cody had been deployed, he’d done his research. Jedi weren’t forbidden from loving—caring for others was one of the core tenets of their philosophy, after all—or having romantic relationships. But if they were to remain Jedi, they had to forswear selfish attachment.

It had taken Cody a while to wrap his head around the subtle difference between the two. Clones, after all, weren’t technically allowed any possessions. They had their names, their brothers, and their armor designs, though the latter two belonged to the GAR. They loved their brothers fiercely, but Cody didn’t think he’d ever met a clone who loved  _ selfishly _ —Slick had been selfish, but Cody doubted his actions were motivated by love. As much as it would tear Cody to shreds inside, he would never sacrifice the lives of others to save one of his batchmates, or Rex, or Obi-Wan.

The willingness to put the needs of others first was so deeply ingrained in every clone, that Cody didn’t fully understand what ‘selfish attachment’ meant until Rex had told him about the shitshow of Skywalker rescuing his astromech near the beginning of the war. Rex’s general had gone in search of the droid, risking not only his Padawan’s life, but the lives of Rex and four other clones. In the end, they’d found R2, but only the two Jedi, Rex, and Denal had come back alive. Cody liked the resourceful little droid, but even if a brother had been the one missing, he never would have thrown away so many lives on the slim chance of a rescue.

Years later, Cody thinks he has a pretty good grasp of what the Jedi mean when they forbid ‘attachment.’ He loves Obi-Wan, and Obi-Wan cares  _ deeply  _ for his friends and family. But Cody knows that neither of them would prioritize the life of a loved one over the lives of many.

“Cody?”

Realizing he’s stopped rifling through the datapads and has just been staring blankly into his pack, Cody shakes himself and tries to smooth out his jagged emotions. Obi-Wan had probably noticed his abrupt shifts in mood.

He clears his throat, grabbing three datapads at random. “Sorry, just…” There aren’t enough words for everything spinning through his mind, so he sets the pads on the table next to Obi-Wan’s caf and rests his elbows on his thighs.

He feels Obi-Wan shift, sitting forward, but Cody keeps his gaze firmly locked on a tiny divot in the floor that’s probably been there for decades. Maybe some youngling was practicing levitating objects and had dropped something heavy…

Obi-Wan ghosts his hand over Cody’s unarmored back, hesitates for a beat, then settles it more firmly across his ribs. Cody has to concentrate to keep his breathing slow and even.

“Are you—Did something happen?” Obi-Wan asks, his thumb moving almost imperceptibly over Cody’s uniform. “You know I try not to invade anyone’s privacy, but you… were projecting a whole tangle of feelings quite loudly.”

“Sorry,” Cody finds himself saying again, and rubs a hand over his face. “It’s just that… a lot has changed, and I guess I got caught up thinking about the past for a minute.” He feels ridiculous for being so nervous. He and Obi-Wan both know—have known for a long time—that there’s something between them. But acknowledging it feels like stepping into the open after ambushing the enemy. Where before you were safe, now you’re out in the open and anything can happen.

He takes a deep breath, dropping his elbows back to his thighs. He has to thread his fingers together to hide the tremor in his hands. “And… about the future.”

Obi-Wan’s thumb stills on Cody’s back. He allows Cody plenty of time to pull away as he reaches forward with his other hand, wrapping his long fingers over the knot of Cody’s fists.

He’s never needed the Force to read Cody’s mind.

Cody looks down at their hands for a moment, studying the scars on Obi-Wan’s knuckles that never got treated with bacta. He’s seen them before, has wanted to run his fingers over them and feel the small ridges of improperly healed skin. Resisting the urge, he turns his head to regard Obi-Wan. From this close Cody can see the permanent worry line between his eyebrows, and tell that he’s gone a couple days too long between beard trims. Obi-Wan’s gaze flickers down Cody’s face, then back up to his eyes.

“Would you like to tell me,” Obi-Wan murmurs, “what you were thinking?”

Cody untangles his fingers and turns his hands over to cup Obi-Wan’s between them. Obi-Wan glances down at their joined hands and his throat bobs as he swallows.

“Yeah, I”—Cody licks his lips—”was thinking that, with everything going on, today might be the last quiet day we get for a while. And…” He exhales, rubbing a thumb over the back of Obi-Wan’s hand. “I didn’t want to wait any longer to ask you.”

Obi-Wan’s lips part, but he doesn’t say anything. Cody knows Obi-Wan is giving him time to gather his words, and that, as Cody’s superior officer, he’s always wary of pressuring Cody in any way.

Okay, looks like it’s up to Cody to lay the cards on the table.

Keeping a hold of Obi-Wan’s hand, Cody turns to face him more fully. As he moves, Obi-Wan’s hand on his back trails down his arm and stops at his wrist with a soft grip.

Cody is sure Obi-Wan must be able to hear his heart pounding in the quiet room. The ventilation system hasn’t kicked on in a while, so when Cody clears his throat, it’s startlingly loud in his own ears. “There’s been something here”—he nods to the distance between them—”for a long time. And I just wanted to know if… If you want it to be something more.” He’s so nervous he’s almost dizzy. “Because I do.”

Obi-Wan inhales and his hand tightens on Cody’s wrist. “Cody…” He tilts forward, though the move looks unintentional, eyes darting over Cody’s face. “May I kiss you?”

There’s barely any space between them. He can smell traces of caf and bacta mixed with whatever detergent the Temple uses on Jedi clothes. Instead of answering, Cody closes the distance and brushes his lips over Obi-Wan’s.

Obi-Wan presses back immediately, bringing his hands up to hold Cody’s face and neck.

Suddenly finding his hands free, Cody tangles the fingers of one hand in the hair at the nape of Obi-Wan’s neck. Mindful of injuries, he spreads the other one across Obi-Wan’s lower back and pulls him closer.

“Cody,” Obi-Wan gasps, and Cody takes advantage of the opening to tilt his head and seal their open mouths together.

He hears himself make a low sound as Obi-Wan’s fingers trace his cheekbones and dip inside his collar. His rational thoughts seem to have receded and all he can focus on is the softness of Obi-Wan’s lips, the prickle of his moustache, the flex of his muscles under Cody’s hands, the sweep of Obi-Wan’s fingers over his skin.

Their seated positions are awkward, but Cody twists as much as he can to prevent Obi-Wan from aggravating the wound in his side. He presses their chests together while they kiss and breath into each others’ mouths.

Obi-Wan tilts Cody’s head back with the hand on his jaw and Cody complies without a thought. Obi-Wan trails open-mouthed kisses down to his neck and swirls his tongue over Cody’s hammering pulse. The hot pressure punches all the air out of Cody’s lungs in a strangled groan.

Dimly, Cody thinks that he did  _ not  _ expect the morning to go like this. He fists a hand into the back of Obi-Wan’s tabards, and Obi-Wan squirms against him, making his way up to nibble at Cody’s earlobe. The sound of uneven breath in his ear makes Cody shiver and gasp.

He  _ desperately  _ wants to push Obi-Wan back and crowd him against the arm of the sofa, pull his tunics away from his neck and—

Obi-Wan almost whimpers. “Do it,” he breathes in Cody’s ear.

Cody jerks a little. Had he said—

“Sorry,” Obi-Wan murmurs against his throat, making it  _ very  _ hard to concentrate. “You were just being loud again.”

Cody tugs gently on Obi-Wan’s hair, tipping his head to bring their mouths together again. “You’re injured,” he puffs between kisses.

Obi-Wan makes a sound of protest and nips at his lower lip. It takes every molecule of discipline in Cody’s body, but he manages to pull away enough to press their foreheads together. Breathing hard and gently rubbing his nose against Obi-Wan’s, he tries to ease off the throttle. It’s unreasonably difficult.

Cody closes his eyes and strokes his fingers through Obi-Wan’s soft hair—he’s thought about doing that for  _ years _ . “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t,” Obi-Wan whispers, sounding absolutely certain. He runs his fingers down Cody’s cheek, brushing a thumb over his lips.

Cody shivers again, opening his eyes to find Obi-Wan already watching him, pupils blown wide. Something in Cody’s gut clenches almost painfully and he lets out a shaky breath. He wants to—he  _ wants _ . But when Obi-wan moves in to kiss him again, Cody tightens his grip on Obi-Wan’s hair, which earns him another small gasp as Obi-Wan’s eyes slip shut.

Kriff, he’s not making this whole self-control thing easy at the moment.

Cody loosens the fingers clutching Obi-Wan’s tabards and rubs that hand up and down his back, across the knobs of his spine and the muscles stretched over his shoulder blades.

He desperately tries to tear his thoughts away from hungry kisses and gentle hands to focus on Tython two rotations ago, and how much blood had soaked Obi-Wan’s tunics by the end of the fight with Dooku.

***

Cody has no choice but to stay back from the fight between the Sith and the three Jedi Generals. As much as he wants to stay close to Obi-Wan, he knows Dooku would likely target him just to toy with the Jedi, and he refuses to be a lability. So he’s perched on a nearby ridge with a DC-15x sniper rifle. There’s not much he can do with the Force users leaping around among the boulders and dry vegetation below, but he hopes he can at least distract Dooku and make a few openings for the Jedi.

Peering through his rifle’s rangefinder, Cody has an excellent view of the battle. A couple minutes in, he sees Dooku graze Obi-Wan’s shoulder with his red saber, but Obi-Wan shrugs it off. General Yoda dives in low while General Windu slashes at Dooku’s neck, but the Sith twists in a way that shouldn’t be possible for someone his age, and stretches his arms out to launch the Jedi away from him. Windu hits a large boulder, but it obscures Cody’s view, so he brings the rangefinder around to see Dooku shooting lightning at Yoda while parrying Obi-Wan’s blue saber. Yoda, several meters back, seems to be catching it with his saber, somehow.

Cody exhales slowly, centering Dooku’s chest in his sight and hoping he can get a shot off if Obi-Wan backs away...

Without warning, Dooku whips around, and the lighting follows after his hand, arcing across the ground before slamming into Obi-Wan. Cody’s blood runs cold when he sees Obi-Wan seize up and Dooku’s saber slices through the air toward Obi-Wan’s midsection.

Yoda is dashing forward.

Cody squeezes the trigger.

But by the time Dooku has to snap his saber up to block the blaster bolt, the red blade has already bitten into Obi-Wan’s side.

Windu appears again, diving between Dooku and Obi-Wan as Yoda leaps at the Sith.

Cody’s heart feels like it’s going to beat its way up his throat and escape, but he holds his position as Obi-Wan stumbles against a rock and slides down it to sit on the ground.

Yoda almost gets his ear taken off, and Dooku catches Windu with more of the lightning, but Windu somehow flings a boulder at Dooku while being electrocuted. The Sith ducks low, but as the boulder sails over him Yoda leaps into the space just behind it. When Dooku twists back up, Yoda is there, dropping down nearly on top of him. Dooku can’t parry in time, and Yoda plunges his green saber into Dooku’s chest, cutting a diagonal line down to one hip.

Dropping his rifle, Cody sprints full tilt down the scrub-covered hillside to reach his general, barking orders into his comm for the medic team standing by to make for his position.

Covering the distance seems to take an eternity and no time at all. Leaping prickly scrub and skirting larger rocks, Cody sees Yoda, one ear bleeding freely, kneeling by his former apprentice. Windu is stiffly making his way to Obi-Wan, but when he looks in Cody’s direction, he pauses, then moves to join Yoda instead.

Cody crashes through a large bush and skids to his knees next to Obi-Wan, who’s still leaning against the rock, legs stretched out in front of him. The saber burn on his shoulder appears to be mostly cauterized, but Cody feels an icy jolt in his gut at the sight of Obi-Wan’s fingers pressed over a circular hole in his tunics, just above the belt. There’s already so much blood, and Cody can’t tell if the sweat beading on Obi-Wan’s face is from the fight, or shock setting in.

Cody’s vaguely aware of Obi-Wan trying to reassure him that he’s okay, but he focuses on keeping his hands steady when he tears open the small medpac he carries in a pouch. He has a stim-shot, which will at least help with shock, a coagulant, and a few small bacta patches. He jabs the stim into Obi-Wan’s neck, then pushes his slippery hands out of the way to get to the wound in his side and administer the coagulant. Cody’s not sure how much the small amount will even help, but it’s better than nothing. After he applies the bacta patches, he checks on the status of the med team—90 seconds out—and sits in the dirt with Obi-Wan, gloves shiny with blood, and holds his hand.

***

“No,” Cody says, wrapping his arms around Obi-Wan and pressing his nose against the soft, clean tunics on his neck, “You were badly injured.” He shakes his head, breathing in the smell of Obi-Wan,  _ alive  _ and  _ here _ . His heart is still pounding, but he slows his breathing, murmurs. “I can wait.”

Cody feels Obi-Wan press a soft kiss to his temple as he shifts his arms to encircle Cody’s chest.

“Well,” Obi-Wan huffs, lips moving over Cody’s skin, “I suppose we’ve waited long enough. What’s another few days?”

Feeling silly for needing the reassurance, but unable to resist, Cody brings one hand around to rest lightly over the bandages on Obi-Wan’s middle.

“I’m okay, Cody.” There’s a smile in Obi-Wan’s voice. “Really. You didn’t hurt me.”

Exhaling, Cody pulls back just enough to bring them level with each other. He reaches up and cups the side of Obi-Wan’s face in one hand, brushing a thumb across his cheek. Obi-Wan leans into it, closing his eyes.

“I…” Cody starts, not sure how to say everything he wants to say. He settles on, “This is going to change things.”

Obi-Wan opens his eyes, smiling. “Some things, yes.” He mirrors Cody, resting a hand on Cody’s face, close to his scar. “But we were going to end up here sooner or later. Cody, I…” He pauses, searching Cody’s face. “I’ve been… I’ve felt this way for a long time.”

Cody can’t help but return the smile. “Me too.”


End file.
